The golden master build of iOS 5.1 for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch is said to have passed Apple's internal quality assurance testing and will arrive in the coming days with Japanese support for Siri and other unknown features.

The hacker known as "Chronic," who is a member of the iOS jailbreaking community, revealed the news in a post to his official blog on Tuesday, citing a "very solid source." He said the golden master of iOS 5.1 recently completed a three-week "vigorous quality assurance phase," and should be released in the coming days.

The software update is expected to have support for the Japanese language with Siri, Apple's voice control personal assistant software currently found in the iPhone 4S. The GM build of iOS 5.1 is said to be known as "9B176."

In addition, iOS 5.1 is said to include two unknown new features that have not yet been leaked to the public. The update is also said to feature an easier method of accessing the camera from the lock screen, something that was leaked in a screenshot of an alleged pre-GM build of iOS 5.1 last month.

iOS 5.1 has reportedly been tested internally at Apple, as well as with various carriers and partners. Because of this, the build may already be in the hands of some unauthorized people, but because the firmware is not being signed on external servers, it cannot be installed on any unauthorized iOS devices.

Apple began seeding beta releases of iOS 5.1 to developers last November. A second beta arrived in December, followed by a third beta in January, but since then there have not been any new betas issued to developers.

It's likely that iOS 5.1 will be discussed or even released at Apple's media event on Wednesday in San Francisco, where the company is expected to unveil its third-generation iPad. The event will kick off at 10 a.m. Pacific, 1 p.m. Eastern.

Moving away from them would be a open letter to the world about how Apple feels about Google. I can see how demoing their new Maps and Vimeo Player on the iPad HD would be effective, but I agree with TS making them features in iOS 6 makes more sense.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

Going multiuser just adds another layer of cruft on what should be a personal device.

What about a guest option? They have already implemented a part of that for the camera app when accessing from a locked screen. I don't think it would be too hard to employee the same action for Safari or the basic phone dialer. These could be dis/enabled in Settings.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

What about a guest option? They have already implemented a part of that for the camera app when accessing from a locked screen. I don't think it would be too hard to employee the same action for Safari or the basic phone dialer. These could be dis/enabled in Settings.

Going multiuser just adds another layer of cruft on what should be a personal device.

If the FaceTime camera could recognize the face of the person unlocking the iDevice, it could then open that person's data/mail/etc. It would be invisible to the user(s) until they wandered why they see only their own iBooks and those are always opened to where they stopped reading last.

What in the world is "cruft"?

"That (the) world is moving so quickly that iOS is already amongst the older mobile operating systems in active development today." — The Verge

1) File Management and File Sharing among apps -- on the iDevice, iCloud and Desktop Macs and PCs.

This is interesting because I've recent become even more frustrated with iOS file handling. Safari for example could be far more useful if it could access easily locally stored files. ICloud is still a problem because not all apps mirror a copy of your files locally. Thus you are screwed if you are without a network connection. Other issues have also showed up which leaves me wanting a common local repository where data can be stored.

That would be nice even if it is a pipe dream. That is the idea that they could do so well as to have an impact on file size over today's alternatives.

That being said I do wish that Apple would support more common video formats found on the web. Some very interesting stuff has been around for years and frankly such files will never be updated to new codecs.

Quote:

One big bug I'd like to see fixed is Safari and its reloading of stale data when the back button is hit. this has been driving me nuts lately. Safari crashes far to much also.

I'd really like to see an innovative storage system/ database / organizer of the likes of HyperCard or something similarly powerful but easy to use. I've looked at more than a few on app store but have yet to find the right one.

I'd also like to see the clock and alarms system from iPhone ported to the pad devices. The clock, especially the stop watch feature are extremely handy at work. The alternatives just don't work as well.

It would be nice if Apple would supply a lib for the decode of bar codes and the various 2D codes to developers. This would allow a far greater number of developers to quickly leverage cameras for all sorts of apps.

I believe the secret to the post-personal computer era is the "individual computer".

I can't think of anyone in my immediate family that isn't worth the $500 for their own computer.

My first draft had more apps that could be used in a Guest setting but I figured my argument was best if it was less complex.

I assume you are kidding about history, bookmarks, etc. If not, remember this would be a Guest option, where you let someone use your iPhone but don't want them accessing your data. Nothing would be recorded by these apps. Even Safari which one assumes does some caching would remove everything once you go back out to the Lock Screen.